As a user in today’s world, it’s hard to keep up with the different sorts of hardware equipment being released on a daily basis. Most tech savvy users find a way to keep themselves updated on what new technology has taken up the market. There are certain common devices that are present in almost every home but not all home owners know what it really does or how far you can customize it in order to get the most out of it. The router is a device that is common for every home network since it allows communication between your local home network and the Internet. Through this local network your personal devices such as tablets and phones can easily connect to the World Wide Web.
A router is basically the optimal device when it comes to not only creating a LAN but also having a high level of security in order to protect your devices and the data on it being shared online. Some routers are wireless while some are wired. Most router models share a unique IP address that gives access to your router’s configuration page or administration page. Through this you can change settings such as SSID, adding a security key, guest networks, parent control, bandwidth management etc. To find out your router’s IP, enter “ipconfig” in Command Prompt. The numbers given next to “default gateway” will be the IP address of your router that can be entered in a browser and logged into to manage your router’s settings. A router device contains a main WAN port that connects it to the modem providing the internet connection. Other LAN ports can be used to connect the router directly to the device such as a computer or a console. In layman terminology, the router basically acts as a gateway, connecting your devices to traffic online. Making sure your security is high is very important since strangers can easily use a vulnerability to access your data or even use your WiFi network. For this reason, most routers come with WPA but the more modern and better security format is WPA2.
Other than that, each router has a firmware or software that should be updated regularly as released by the manufacturer. This is because past versions can contain security loop holes or vulnerabilities that may cause malicious threats to your home network. Newer versions have more features, better security and also improve the overall performance of the router. These days, there are multiple bands of routers such as single, dual and tri. The single band router is capable of running only on 2.4GHz frequency, which has more interference but has better range. Dual band routers work on two frequencies that is 2.4GHz and 5GHz. Although 5GHz is faster and has less interference, it has shorter range. Tri band routers, being the most expensive of the three, work on one 2.4GHz and two 5GHz frequencies allowing better flow of data and better speeds.
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